1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a pressureless apparatus for aligning various objects, such as bottles, which comprises a multi-track feed conveyor, an intermediate conveyor consisting of a plurality of juxtaposed paddled chains overlying these chains and a curvilinear guide-plate leading to a single-track output conveyor.
This invention is intended more particularly for the industrial branch concerned with the conveyance of miscellaneous objects, notably bottles.
2. The Prior Art
It is known to use conveyors of the type called pressureless aligners for narrowing a stream of objects disposed at random on a relatively wide conveyor, so as to canalize these objects to form a single row or line feeding any treatment or processing unit.
Thus, in the field of conveyors for containers and more particularly bottles, these aligners are disposed upstream of machines such as filling machines, label-sticking machines, capsuling machines or other machines, in order to feed these machines with bottles supplied one by one and in line.
Of course, these pressureless aligners comprise a multi-track feed conveyor on which the bottles disposed at random are caused to move at a relatively low speed. This feed conveyor leads to an intermediate conveyor consisting of a plurality of elementary curvilinear paddle-chains disposed side by side and over which a likewise curvilinear guide-plate is provided for pushing the bottles transversely from one paddle-chain to the next paddle-chain. Each track of this intermediate conveyor is driven at a different speed, this speed increasing in a direction across the direction of travel of the bottles, in order to gradually accelerate the bottles and reduce the width of the stream of bottles delivered to the feed conveyor proper.
At the output end of this intermediate conveyor, it is essential that the various bottles form a single row before engaging an output conveyor reduced to a single track. In fact, if two bottles happened to engage side by side the imput end of this output conveyor, they might block the passage and thus interrupt the bottle supply, which eventually will cause stoppage of the plant. It is also possible that one of these bottles may be discharged from the conveyor and dropped into an adjacent recovery bin. However, this implies the frequent intervention of an operator for reintroducing the bottles contained in the recovery bin into the feed circuit. However, the most recurrent consequence is the breakage of one and/or the other of the bottles forming a double row under the pressure of the oncoming bottles. As a result, of course, glass fragments particularly dangerous for the operators standing in the vicinity would be thrown therearound. Moreover, the glass fragments remaining on the output conveyor may also cause the stoppage of the treatment unit disposed dowstream or the undesired release of mechanical or optical sensors disposed along the conveyor and delivering data to a plant control unit.
A first solution aiming at reducing the above-defined risks consists in extending considerably the length of the intermediate conveyor so that the probability of the simultaneous engagement of two bottles at the input end of the output conveyor be substantially zero.
Now, in fact, the present trend is to minimize the floor space of this type of intermediate or transitory conveyor, so as to reduce the size of the equipments and, eventually, of the rooms in which they are installed.
Pressureless aligners are also known which are constructed substantially on the basis of the aligner broadly described hereinabove, which comprises an intermediate conveyor inclined transversely with respect to the direction of travel of the bottles, this cant being in the range of about 5.degree. to 8.degree.. Thus, the stream of bottles travelling on the feed conveyor are led to the lower portion of the intermediate conveyor and driven by the paddle-chains along the guide-plate which in turn directs the bottles towards the upper portion leading to the single-track output conveyor.
The cant of the intermediate conveyor facilitates on the one hand the bottle alignment and on the other hand the removal of the glass fragments or of the recumbent bottles disposed on this intermediate conveyor. Nevertheless, the risk of allowing bottles to form a double row persists and consequently the length of this pressureless aligner is still considerable.
Of course, the use of any kind of pressure for aligning the bottles must be avoided since as it is not only a source of noise, but increases the number of bottles broken as a consequence of the frequent knocking of the bottles against one another.